You probably learned your basic human anatomy sometime around grade school. Textbooks said your blood was red and a scraped knee on the playground confirmed it. We bleed red because of hemoglobin, an iron-containing protein that carries oxygen throughout the body. So… Why Are My Blood Veins Blue?

Pope Benedict XVI said the debate raging in some countries — particularly the United States and his native Germany — between creationism and evolution was an “absurdity,” saying that evolution can coexist with faith.

The pontiff, speaking as he was concluding his holiday in northern Italy, also said that while there is much scientific proof to support evolution, the theory could not exclude a role by God.

“They are presented as alternatives that exclude each other,” the pope said. “This clash is an absurdity because on one hand there is much scientific proof in favor of evolution, which appears as a reality that we must see and which enriches our understanding of life and being as such.”